Wednesday, June 17, 2015

EDIT 21 June, 2015: I wrote this review before knowing much about the recent madness in Charleston, S.C. I apologize for the poor timing, especially to anyone who's read before this edit. (I'm 50, and the realities of digital media don't come easily to me; I tend to forget how easy it is to edit the blog, for example.)
These remain my views on the film, but right now they are trivial at best.

The sitcom 30 Rock once did an episode in which Tracy Morgan's character made a "serious" movie, a piece of autobiographical Oscar-bait about his troubled childhood. This way-over-the-top film-within-a-film seemed to be a parody of the then-current movie Precious, the biopic about a young black woman who's been horribly abused for years. Though I was a fan of 30 Rock at the time, I remember thinking the parody unkind. Precious was directed by Lee Daniels, who'd already co-produced Monster's Ball, and would go on to the current TV hit Empire. Now that I've seen both those films, I can see exactly where 30 Rock was coming from. At least Precious was apparently based on a true story, whereas Monster's Ball is just shameless manipulation, piling on misfortunes as if terrified we'll stop taking it seriously.

Lee Daniels also put his name in front of The Butler. All of these movies and more (The Help, 42) seem best suited for suburban white people, for guilt mitigation. These movies do everything but take my hand and say, "Now you hush, chile. Ain't nothin' to be afeared of , 'cause black folk is jus' folk, jus' like you."

** major spoilers ahead **

Monster's Ball was showered with awards, but to me this just proves again that certain topics paralyze the critical faculties: the Holocaust, race in America. It's the story of a prison guard (Billy Bob Thornton) who falls in love with Halle Berry, after helping to execute Halle's ex-husband (Sean Combs), who'd abused her. The guard had a racist upbringing, but fortunately both of their sons die violent deaths (within days of each other), which is quite an ice-breaker, and before you know it we get some admittedly steamy, interracial sex scenes.

So yes, this is an interracial love story. Barely. It seems to me that a racist redneck finding redemption in the arms of Halle Berry is like the person who claims they can't be anti-Semitic because they love Jesus.
Then again, this movie was made in 2001, when we were all more innocent.